


best friends, ex-friends 'til the end (better off as lovers)

by orphan_account



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Angst, M/M, One Shot, Swearing, shark...week?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-09
Updated: 2013-08-09
Packaged: 2017-12-22 22:09:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,085
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/918599
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He hopes Louis hasn't been killed by sea creatures and gets back soon so he can be distracted from whatever the hell this is.</p>
<p>Niall grabs Zayn’s arm and shakes it a bit to get his attention before nodding up at a slow moving cloud, “Hey, this one’s like a great white, yeah?” </p>
<p>(or, sharks and pain. but the pain isn't because of the sharks.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	best friends, ex-friends 'til the end (better off as lovers)

**Author's Note:**

> This is incredibly short, sorry! I haven't written anything in months so I'm easing back into it. I might write more of this story if inspiration strikes. We'll see! This was originally supposed to be something funny/cute for shark week. Sorry for turning a happy ship into a kind of sad one, oops. The title is from Bang the Doldrums by Fall Out Boy.

"I couldn't bring myself to call, except to call it quits"

 

Zayn’s got no idea where Louis’ fucked off to. At some point he’d heard him shouting a string of expletives but didn’t pay much attention. (“Fucking jellyfish tried to off me, what did I ever do to the ocean to deserve this? I haven’t had a wee in there since I was five!”)

He’s sitting as far away from the water as he can without it seeming strange, not doing anything other than focusing on the shapes up above him, trying to make them out through his raybans.

He is absolutely not thinking about the familiar bottle blonde he’d spotted a short while ago sitting a few umbrellas over. Zayn is just about to decide he’d only imagined it but of course, life isn’t going to do him any more favors.

“What’re you doing?”

Shit. 

“Looking for sharks.”

“There aren’t any sharks in the sky, mate. Have you been smoking without me?” Niall laughs and drops down onto the small blanket, presses in close to Zayn so he doesn’t end up half on the sand.

Zayn winces internally and pretends that ‘mate’ doesn’t sting. “They’re in the clouds, Ni.” He forces one arm up to point out a particularly menacing one. “Right there, look. That one's a bull shark.” He lets his arm fall back down to rest on his stomach. His limbs feel useless and the scent of sunblock and dryer sheets on the boy lying next to him is not helping one bit. He’s suffocating. 

After all this time, Niall still smells like home. Their old home. On days when Niall would sneak out of bed at dawn to “go to the gym”, Zayn would pick up the dirty tanks scattered across their bedroom floor and toss them in the wash, then head to the kitchen to wipe up the crumbs Niall surely left on the table. He never minded though, loved the domesticity of it. Zayn had felt content and settled for once in his life.

But when he least expected it, Niall left. Didn’t come back to whisper goodnights and I love yous with that pretty pretty accent that Zayn always tried to translate into his art. 

So, a week or so after one of the worst phone calls of his life, the 'sorry' scribbled on a post-it stuck to his front door, plus the key that wasn't his abandoned under the mat, Zayn found himself falling into a pathetic routine. He’d sink into the couch at midnight, wishing it would swallow him whole. Wishing his boy was behind him, tracing the ink on his collarbone and his wrists, and the sensitive heart on his hip. Pressing a kiss to the fantail on the back of his neck. He’d play it over and over again in his head until the sunlight blinded him through cheap sheer curtains they’d bought together after twenty minutes of dicking around in the store, testing out pillows in a pile on the floor and making out in the towel aisle.

On those rough nights, he'd have forgiven Niall in a second if he showed up at his door. It didn't matter that Niall had just disappeared. Zayn still needed him back, anything to quiet down the bats in his stomach.

And right now, with the boy who isn’t his anymore curled up within inches of his heavy heart, having the nerve to remind him of those days, he wants to say something. Anything. But Zayn just exhales, continues naming and counting sharks in his head like it’s his job. He hopes Louis hasn't been killed by sea creatures and gets back soon so he can be distracted from whatever the hell this is.

Niall grabs Zayn’s arm and shakes it a bit to get his attention before nodding up at a slow moving cloud, “Hey, this one’s like a great white, yeah?” 

Zayn’s eyes dart away from the sky for the first time since Niall invited himself into his space. It's the first time they've spoken more than a word to each other in over a year but Niall can touch him like it's only been days and Zayn needs to know how. 

He glances down at the boy’s grip on his forearm. Niall still fucking sets his skin on fire. The water’s maybe twenty feet away, he’d jump up and run to it as fast as humanly possible if he wasn’t certain he’d drown.

Instead, he settles for acting like everything’s just swell (like Niall isn’t burning him up faster than the sun ever could), mentally gets his shit together and rolls his eyes as he replies, “That’s cos it’s the only kind you know.” He manages to get his other hand working and uses it to pry Niall’s off him and adds, “It’s definitely a thresher. Leave the cloud shark watching to the professionals, mate.” 

There it is again, except this time it’s his own mouth betraying him. Niall was never just a mate, never just one of the lads. He doesn’t even know what he is to him now, but before everything had gone to shit they’d both noticed how wrong those friendly terms felt struggling to roll off their tongues. That was then, and Zayn has to get used to the new rules. 

He thinks about asking Niall how the word comes to him so easily. Because he really, really needs to know, so he can stop feeling like this. But it was him who caused these questions to consume Zayn in the first place and he doesn't want to drag it out so he lets it go. He does his best to tuck all the "hows" and "whys" away, and as painful as it is to even be near him, Zayn decides he isn't going to let it continue to destroy him. He can get through the rest of this vacation and scream in the privacy of his shower when he gets home. He can do this.

Niall’s humming something familiar. Zayn recognizes it as the song he used to sing while cooking breakfast for the two of them. He quickly looks back up at the clouds that seem to be dissipating now and tries to block the sound out. 

Then another voice rings out over the roar of the waves, shouting, “Niall! D’you want a beer, babe?”

Zayn won’t let the pretty pretty dark haired girl with long legs sitting under an umbrella destroy him.

He can do this.


End file.
